Chapter Twenty Two - The Outpost Battle - ( Kael's POV )

The forest closed around us like a noose, the fog wrapping tight around every tree, every stone, every sound. Kael’s hand gripped mine for only a breath before he released it, his instincts driving him forward, his body shifting into that predator’s gait that belonged more to the Alpha than the man. Darius moved ahead, blade drawn, eyes narrowing against the mist. The crack of a branch still echoed in my ears, too sharp, too close. We weren’t alone.

But we kept moving. The outpost lay ahead, a relic of timber and stone lodged deep in the forest. It was no fortress, not by Council standards, but its walls had sheltered killers. I could almost feel their shadows clinging to it as we crept closer. My belly stirred with unease, the child restless within me, as though the prophecy itself whispered warning.

“Stay behind me,” Kael murmured, his voice a low growl. His golden eyes flicked toward me once, softer than his words, then hardened again as his focus returned to the path.

Through the thinning fog, the outpost emerged. A squat structure of moss-streaked stone and rotting timber, its roof sagging but its doors still standing strong. A tower jutted upward, no taller than three men, but enough for a lookout. The scent of men drifted toward us, sweat, iron, oil. They were here.

Darius raised a hand, signaling silence. We crouched low in the underbrush, the damp earth chilling against my skin. He scanned the perimeter, his eyes sharp as a hawk’s.

“Three guards outside,” he whispered. “One at the tower. Likely more inside. If we want the element of surprise, it must be now.”

Kael’s lips curved, not in a smile but in a predator’s promise. “Then now it is.”

Before Darius could counter, Kael moved.

He was a blur of shadow and fury, crashing from the brush with a snarl that split the morning silence. The first guard barely had time to draw breath before Kael’s hand clamped around his throat. Bone cracked beneath his grip, and the man fell lifeless to the dirt.

The second shouted, sword half-drawn, but Kael’s boot slammed into his chest, sending him crashing into the outpost wall with a thud that shook loose old mortar.

The third charged, blade flashing in the dim light. Darius was there before Kael struck. His dagger slid cleanly between the man’s ribs, his expression carved from stone as the guard collapsed, choking on his own blood.

“Tower!” Darius barked.

I looked up. The sentry raised a horn to his lips, desperate to sound the alarm. But Kael, faster than breath, hurled the fallen guard’s sword like a spear. The blade spun end over end and buried itself in the sentry’s chest. The horn clattered uselessly to the ground as the man tumbled from the tower, landing with a sickening crack.

Silence followed. Brief. Fragile. The fog seemed to recoil from the violence, pulling tighter around the trees.

Darius wiped his blade on the grass, his voice low. “The element of surprise is gone now.”

“It was never ours to keep,” Kael growled, his chest heaving. He turned toward the door. “We end this inside.”

The outpost loomed before us, dark and waiting. My pulse thundered as we pushed through its threshold.

The stench of damp wood and stale blood filled the air. The interior was dim, lit by only a handful of guttering torches. The floor was slick with mud, and the walls carried the scars of old battles, scratches, scorch marks, stains that had never been scrubbed clean.

Shadows moved.

Men surged from the corners, blades flashing, war cries shattering the silence.

Kael met them head-on. His roar shook the rafters, primal and unrelenting. He tore into them with his bare hands, claws half-formed, teeth bared in a snarl. Blood sprayed as he ripped one man’s throat open, pivoted, and smashed another’s skull into the stone wall. He was fury incarnate, a storm in flesh, every strike a promise kept, that no one would touch me, or the child, again.

Darius fought with a different kind of violence. He was precise, every movement calculated. His blade flickered in the dim light, swift and merciless, striking throats, slicing tendons, leaving men writhing before they even realized they’d been cut. Where Kael was fire, Darius was steel. Cold. Sharp. I saw no hesitation in him, only the weight of experience that told me he had done this too many times before.

And I...

I wasn’t idle. Fear clawed at me, but so did something else. Resolve. I seized one of the torches from the wall, the flames sputtering in my grip, and swung it at the man who lunged too close. The fire caught his sleeve, then his hair, and he screamed as he fell, rolling on the mud in a desperate attempt to smother the flames.

Kael’s eyes flicked to me once, and though rage still blazed there, pride glimmered too.

The battle raged. The outpost’s walls echoed with the clash of steel, the crunch of bone, the guttural cries of men dying. My ears rang with it, my breath burning in my lungs. Time blurred, collapsing into moments of blood and fire.

Then..... silence.

The last man fell, gurgling on his own blood, and the only sound left was Kael’s ragged breathing, Darius’s steady exhale, and the frantic pounding of my heart.

We had won.

But the air didn’t feel like victory.

Kael wiped his hands on the corpse at his feet, his chest still heaving. His golden eyes flicked to me, softening for only a breath before he turned to Darius. “Is that all of them?”

Darius crouched beside one of the fallen, his expression darkening. He reached into the man’s pocket and pulled free a rolled scrap of parchment. His fingers unfolded it, the torchlight casting shadows across the words.

His face hardened. “No,” he said quietly. “This wasn’t an outpost. It was bait.”

Kael’s growl reverberated through the chamber. “What?”

Darius handed him the parchment. Kael scanned it, his jaw tightening with every word. Then he thrust it toward me.

I took it with trembling hands. The parchment was stained with blood, but the writing was clear.

Bring the wolf, the mate, and the heir. The Council awaits.

My breath caught. The words seemed to burn on the page, heavy with finality. They hadn’t been hunting us here. They had been waiting.

The child shifted violently within me, as if recoiling from the truth. Kael tore the parchment in half, his snarl echoing through the outpost like thunder. “They think they can toy with us. They think they can use her as bait.” His voice was a low, deadly growl. “They’ve made their last mistake.”

But even as his fury burned, I saw it, the trap wasn’t sprung yet. The fog outside thickened. The silence beyond the outpost stretched too deep, too heavy. And then, faint but unmistakable, came the sound.

Boots. Marching. Surrounding us.

Darius’s blade gleamed as he rose to his feet. Kael’s eyes blazed brighter than the torches, his body coiled to strike again.

And me, my hand pressed to my belly, my heart racing with the knowledge that the Council hadn’t merely found us.

They had cornered us.